The Duxbury High School boys’ lacrosse team took its first step toward defending its State title with a 16-3 win over Framingham on Friday afternoon in Duxbury.

The No. 17 seeded Flyers were no match for the No. 1 seeded Dragons, as they fell behind 7-0 in the first quarter and could barely get the ball over midfield until 5:48 remained in the first 12 minutes. Senior Seamus Connelly opened the scoring for Duxbury when he took a feed from classmate Andrew Buron in the slot and buried his shot past goalie Brendan Moran for a 1-0 lead less than two minutes into the contest.

The Dragons would add three goals in a one-minute span minutes later when John Sullivan, Connelly, and Will Siefert connected to beat Moran, forcing Framingham Coach Ed Moy to call a timeout and stop the bleeding.

The timeout was the equivalent of putting a band-aid on a gunshot wound, as it took senior Sam Sweet just 29 seconds after the break to make it 5-0 when he came out from behind the net to Moran’s right and bounced his shot past the beleaguered netminder.

It had been all Duxbury up until this point when Framingham finally got possession and took the ball into their offensive zone for the first time. The possession didn’t last long, as the defense finally got some work and sent the ball back up field where Chris Williams and Siefert scored less than a minute apart for a 7-0 lead.

Williams was on the receiving end of a nice feed from Connelly to open the second quarter and beat Moran for an 8-0 lead.

The Dragons seemed to relax after seeing the ease with which they could score and the defense got caught too far up on consecutive Flyer possessions, leaving Framingham’s Jake Cotton all alone for two unmolested scoring bids on Henry Buonagurio.

Still safely ahead, Duxbury countered with an assault of its own as Reilly Naton, Sweet (2), and Adam Fitzgerald scored to close out the half with a 12-2 lead at intermission.

Coach Chris Sweet went with sophomore Nick Marrocco in net to start the second half and he barely broke a sweat, as the Flyers went scoreless and trailed 13-2 after three quarters.

The fourth quarter saw a slew of Duxbury replacements that included sophomore Brendan Burke, junior Tucker Hannon, senior Parker Leese, junior George Ward, junior Marshall McCarthy and sophomore Wes Quinzani.

It didn’t seem to matter who was on the field for Duxbury, as Zack Snelling, Jay Walsh and Leese added to the Dragons’ rout.

“I was pleased with the way we played after a 10-day lay-off,” said Sweet. “That was one of our concerns as to how we would shake off the rust from the inactivity. I think we came out and were deliberate. When we finally shook off the rust we weren’t getting frustrated with bad passes. Overall we looked sharp from the start and that’s a good sign.”

Quarterfinal action for the Dragons will take place on Wednesday afternoon at 5 p.m. when they face Hockomock League entry and No. 8 seeded Franklin in Duxbury.